Advice -- get a server or not for a small network

[davision]

I am setting up a small network soon. I expect to have 3-5 users, and probably 5-7 computers (extra computers will be for rendering use).

Right now, I have a network with 2 users and about 5 computers and I'm just going peer to peer.

The question is, should I get a server? I have never set one up, but I think I could handle configuring MS Small Business edition since it's supposed to be user-friendly (hard to believe, since it's Microsoft we're talking about, but I'm optimistic).

I just don't know if the server will benefit me very much. I don't think I want to centralize all the data files on the server since I deal with large media files and I think it's better to keep things local, and share certain folders between users.

Anyway, I'm looking for advice on whether my planned network would benefit from a server or whether that's a waste of money.

Thanks.

[Morne]

I'd say its a waste of money and if you havent done it before, not worth the hassles you'll have setting it up and worrying about policies etc. If you're not going more than 10 nodes, then you don't NEED server.

BUT...
if you want some more control over what your users can and cant do, then its quicker to do it from a server

[flino2004]

I have an small network, what I did is centralizated data for projects, and partial copy of my assets library in every computer. The partial copy have the same structure but only has maps and proxies, the maps are out the box from the manufacters....all the custom textures that I need per project are located under each project folder. ( so I don't have to copy to the others computers. I only update them if know that the textures will be used pretty often.
I have a couple NAS drives (RAID 1 each), the structure for that drive are:
X projects - Actives Projects
Y Libraries
Z Administration
O Outputs
Q Archive
My workstation have access to all of them but the rest of the computers only have access to X, Y as I said is storage locally and O. Output is a temporary storage where all the nodes save the renderings, after complete them I move the finals images to X under project name/IMG. "Q" has all the completed projects (zipped). "Z" I have information of my licenses, lists of plugin and software, Invoices,etc)

Fernando